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Sunday, 21 October 2012

Memorable October Storm shows signs of Hazel!

As a potential analog, Hazel rings a bell with this upcoming storm. Ocurring in october and moving inland towards the eastern great lakes Hazel strengthened over lake ontario bringing very strong winds to the city of toronto contrary to expectations or anything ever seen before in a city that isn't effected by hurricanes very often. Many models are showing a tropical system moving inland which would effect much of central and eastern ontario as well as quebec and the maritimes. This is something that can happen and has happened before as history is shown to repeat itself. It is still much to soon to say anything is written in stone and this is just a possibility right now but it would be very cool to experience a tropical like system here in toronto. I have never experienced one before.

October 15th 1954 you can see the system phasing with the trough moving SE:

On October 15, 1954, the most famous hurricane in Canadian history struck Southern Ontario. Hurricane Hazel was projected to dissipate, but instead re-intensified unexpectedly and rapidly, pounding the Toronto region with winds that reached 110 kilometres per hour (68 mph) and 285 millimetres (11.23 inches) of rain in 48 hours. Bridges and streets were washed out, homes and trailers were washed into Lake Ontario. Thousands were left homeless, and 81 people were killed—more than 30 on one street alone. The total cost of the destruction in Canada was estimated at $100 million (about $1 billion today).

Some modelling from our current storm:

GFS at hour 240 shows a 959mb system off the jersey coast and precipitation extending back into ontario.

GEM does not phase systems but will bring tropical system NW around trough and bring precip back to ohio and ontario. Snows would break out in the appalachians, ohio, michigan and parts of ontario on the back side if this interpretation is to be believed. Remember that this was the first model to really see this scenario.

EC phases system with snow on the back side further west toward michigan with 12+ inch amounts and potential disaster along the east coast with 40-50kts winds. Eventually enough cold air moves down to produce snow flurries across the great lakes and ontario. A historical event is shown on this model!

This event is still just under a week away and a lot can happen but a potential memorable event is on the table for the eastern two thirds on the nation. With the upper trough developing a negative tilt this is no doubt a damaging storm.

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